Unfortunately, since for some people it's not about the girl or her father or even the abuser, but instead about the release of otherwise-unacceptable emotion aimed at an acceptable target, there will be people giving him cheers he (decently) does not want to hear.

I've no children, and I'm against the 'out' of crime passionelle as a viable defence in the case of adultery, but what I have observed of parents (and have felt when pets have hacked some of the same systems in me) I think that in this case competence to moderate his attack might be absent.

If I had to sentence him to something, it would be to practicing a traditional martial art that emphasises intention over uncontrolled passion (to help people stay decent, and to be better fighters).

Good on him. Hope the dad’s not indicted, that he’s protected by stand-your-ground laws.

Oh, wait. That's only about protecting gun users, not children.

We must keep our priorities straight.

The Incredible Hulk

I seem to remember those stories of women lifting cars off of children circulating among goofy Christians back in the 80's. They were always citing some sort of divine element to the act and so I'd just written them off as herculean exaggerations, if not outright fabrications.

I have to call bullshit on the mom lifting a car story. I've just spent far too much time on Snopes trying to prove or disprove it, but came up empty.

That's exactly what I would do had it been my daughter.

Just sayin'

I know it is too much to ask for you to do a minute of research Charles, but the story you mention was a woman lifting one side of a car a few inches until rescuers could insert a jack to hold the car up. Nowhere near lifting "an entire car."

Research shows that this not really increased strength, but simply adrenaline and endorphins blocking out pain and fatigue sensors. In other words, you can always do these things, but it hurts, so you stop. In a crisis, the pain is suppressed.

Also, you do not need increased endurance or strength to kill someone with your bare hands by hitting them on the head.

Good on him. I wouldn't have stopped hitting until either the guy's head or my hand were mush. I hope he and his daughter can deal with this trauma, and both have my deepest sympathy.

Man, I hope I'm never in that situation.

@6, A teenager lifted a car off his grandfather a couple of months back. It's amazing what adrenaline can do.
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?sectio…
There's also this: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/extr…

Though I don't really equate lifting a car off of someone with killing someone by punching them in the head. It's not super hard to kill someone if you hit them in the right spot. It's why sometimes inoccuous seeming bumps to the head result in death.

I can't fault the man for his reaction. His instinct to protect his daughter kicked in and that's okay by me. I also think it a far superior reaction than the ones that played out in the Jerry Sandusky case. See someone abusing a child and do nothing? Shameful. React with anger to protect. Good and defensible. I think it's a shame that the abuser died but I won't heap guilt or shame on a man for protecting his kid.

Horrible, all the way round. Although it *is* instant justice for the abuser. :/

I've heard of one punch killing someone. This story about molestation, however, may or may not be true. Suppose they fought about something else and seeing he killed the man, made up the story.

Wow, Charles. I catalog DVDs at the library. I just catalogued Season 1 of The Incredible Hulk. On my break, I go on to Slog to see what Mudede's doing. And you're talking about Episode 1 of The Incredible Hulk.

@2 - On the off chance that you are serious, 'stand your ground' laws generally refer to deadly force and not the instrument that delivers it. Fists, knives, guns, Italian Vogue - you are good to go.

@11 as somebody who boxed and kickboxed for nearly twenty years I can state with some authority it is indeed fairly difficult to kill somebody with a punch. Or I would be dead because I sucked and got punched constantly. Of course I never got into street fights and I fought other trained people who could protect themselves.

What we called "Rabbit punches" (striking the back of the head) were illegal in sport fighting because of the cumulative concussive effect and the rare chance you could kill somebody. Anyway, It's kinda hard to punch somebody in the back of the head. You sometimes see dirty fighters pull a guys head down in the clinch and "slap" the back of the other guys head which can cause a flash knockout pretty easily.

It's the back of the head that is particularly vulnerable and what usually causes a fatality in street altercations is when a person falls after a getting tagged and hits the back of their head on concrete. Or repeated punches to the face and head while the victim is prone and has their skull trapped against a hard surface (that's why in the UFC fighters are now trained to mostly throw lateral hooks when they're in mount).

I'd bet that's what happend here. The guy got on top of the molester dude and unloaded while the molester dudes head was bouncing off concrete. That's why you break that shit up if you see it.

But all that stuff about occipital or bridge of the nose "bones" (the nose is cartilage) being driven into the brain with a punch is nonsense.

Anyway. Just wanted to pop in and dispel a potential myth before the Ninjas Shut-ins on here all assumed they could kill with... ONE BLOW! HYAH!

@15 no, I'm not serious.

Gosh, I hope he didn't fuck up his hands too badly.

@16 - it's also common-place in New Zealand - so much so that "on ya" is a frequently used congratulatory colloquialism, with the 'good' taken as implied.

@17, First off I didn't suggest that killing someone by punching them was somehow super easy. Only that hitting someone in the right spot can easily kill someone. And I'm not wrong: http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2012/02/2…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnew…
http://www.dundee.ac.uk/forensicmedicine…
From that last source: May be natural, due to rupture of a dilated blood vessel (an aneurysm), or traumatic.
SAH is highly irritant to the brain-stem and is usually rapidly fatal. Traumatic SAH may is usually associated with contusion or laceration to the brain surface.
Rarely SAH is due to a kick or blow to the side of the neck which stretches and ruptures the vertebral artery as it enters the cranial cavity. This phenomenon is called traumatic basal SAH and is most often due to a blow to the side of the chin or jaw in an alcoholic fist-fight. The degree of force required to cause death in this way is less than would be reasonably expected, resulting in prosecution for culpable homicide, rather than murder.

@16: I'm in MA, never been to Seattle. You hear it some around here too, guess I never really thought about it.

Good on ya (mate) is Aussie and NZ every day usage

Texas Father: "I'm very remorseful about killing that guy"
Sheriff Micah Harmon: "It's OK."

Too bad he didn't kill the filthy bastard with repeated kicks to the balls instead. Good riddance.

Life imitates The Wire.

@21

Sorry I didn't mean imply you specifically said it was easy. But I wanted to head off the yarn spinners. It's still very, very, rare to punch somebody dead.

BTW: The two deaths cited one was a freak aneurism of a little girl who was punched, and the other— the kid who died in police custody— is described as "blunt force" trauma or a "blow to the head" it didn't it say it was a punch and could have easily been a club weapon.

I'm pretty sure watching your dad punch someone in the head to death is pretty traumatic, too. You know what have worked even better to save his daughter? Saying "what the fuck!! stop that" and calling the police.

He should lose custody of his daughter and get major prison time, but he won't, because rednecks live for any flimsy excuse for violence and murder (see: any hollywood movie).

@28, do you honestly think the average person would react to that scenario with anything other than a blind rage? I don't even have kids but if I were him I imagine I would also have beaten the molester without an iota of restraint.